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Re: beginner needs help

Last spring I searched for treatment free bees available commercially and there are more than what you'd think available. I ended up order from B Weaver and UPS delivered the packages. They were not inexpensive and finding out if they will thrive in my environment will take a few years.

Treatment free and small cell - the search will be harder, but my thinking based on anecdotal evidence from BeeSource and other sources is that bees meeting your friend's requirements are available if you look hard enough.

I am hoping that TF bees will thrive in climates substantially different from their home climate. As someone who is generally opposed to high colony mortality in the bee yard I will embrace bees that are almost TF - Kim Flottum observed recently that Russian Bees are not as robust at coexisting with mites as we had hoped, but they are still better at it than ordinary bees, and should need less beekeeper supplied help to survive and thrive in most climates.

I wish your friend well with his search - please keep us posted on how things work out.

Oh yes, what equipment will he need? Depends upon climate of course - here in Maine the usual is two deeps for the brood chamber and shallows for honey supers. So for my area the list of needed equipment for year 1 would include, solid bottom board, three deep boxes, one honey super, frames and foundation to fill two of the deep boxes and the honey super, an inner cover (with notch), telescoping cover, smoker, hive tools (plural), veil and/or jacket, an entrance reducer and a friction feeder. Gloves are a matter of preference - So long as your friend can be confident working bees without them - I'd skip them. Me, I keep them available and use them more often than not. For wintering I use roofing paper, 2" fiberglass insulation cut to fit the inner cover and a strap to run around the hive to keep everything together. Stones/cement blocks can work but I've had them slide off in the winter and then had the outer and inner covers blow off.

Re: beginner needs help

If your friend wants to go full bore, flat out, drink the Cool-Aid, small cell... I would recommend the following :

Use Mann Lake's PF-120's for everything. Trimming them down to 1.25" is an option. There's less bridge comb with wooden frames so if there is some extra money to spend (some would say waste) the plastic pf foundation can be mounted in wooden frames.

My two strongest hives last spring had narrow frames.

I started with small cell nucs. If a sc nuc is available, that's a good option. Otherwise, many have reported that their package bees have drawn the small cell foundation correctly the first time. Unlike wax, the pf frames can be scraped off and returned to the hive to be drawn out again. I scraped off some old "dried up" disused pf-120's and put them back in this year. I was surprised how quickly new wax was drawn out.

The U.S. made Honey Super Cell frames are not as nice as the ones that were made in China. I warmed and dipped my hsc through a layer of wax melted on top of a large pot of water. My wax coated hsc has been readily accepted. The problem is that it is not cheap and it demands a bit of work to prepare them... But, after a couple of brood cycles after forcing bees onto the HSC there's no returning to cycle new or scraped frames into the hive.

Re: beginner needs help

I forced one package, otherwise boxes of HSC were placed over bees that I wasn't sure of being sc. I have about 40 frames of HSC in a number of hives and nucs. I can start new colonies with those frames, knowing, without any doubt, that the bees are "small cell".

There are a few choices :

1. You buy sc bees.
2. You put the package of bees on "pf" frames and possibly cycle some frames
3. Do the intermediate foundation thing with I believe, 5.1mm wax
4. Force the bees onto hsc

#3 would be my last choice. I have limited time, and even more limited patience.

I would suggest that your friend buy/build some five frame nuc equipment if possible. It will be nice to have when queen cells come along.

Re: beginner needs help

do you have any specific recommendations for the type of foundation, given that he wants small cell bees?

what are your thoughts about going foundationless with narrow frames?

The B Weaver bees are doing ok but not great. They required substantially more feed than my other bees. Two of eight colonies failed for non disease/parasite issues. I should have caught the drone layer/laying worker problem early enough to save the colony, but I didn't. At times their temperament is "testy" and at times they are completely mellow. They are going in to their first winter. {Colonies were established in new equipment, new Permadent Plastic foundation in wooden frames (with my own wax painted on the foundation} Entrances were left reduced all summer.)

I have no experience with SC foundation nor foundationless frames and hesitate to offer any recommendations. For myself I remain unconvinced that SC benefits the bees and believe that the success reported by many SC beekeepers is due to other management practices (deliberate or not).

Re: beginner needs help

SC nucs would be the best option, of course, but they are not an option for your friend unless he can find them within the state of AL. Unless he just smuggles them in. don the fat beeman (www.dixiebeesupply.com) does SC, according to his website. -js

Re: beginner needs help

Squarepeg, These guys have told you right. Wolf Creek & DixiebeeSupply are both SC & chemical free. I know them both, especially Wolf Creek. They are very good folks to deal with. I will be buying from them this spring.

Re: beginner needs help

Originally Posted by squarepeg

but there are no treatment free small cell bees for sale anywhere, not even packages.

That's not true.

Originally Posted by squarepeg

he's not computer savy.

That's why. If you want information, you've got to go where it is. The vast majority of information on treatment-free beekeeping is available online free. A much smaller portion of it is available in book form. Let him use your computer.

Re: beginner needs help

Has your friend considered using top bar hives? There are two basic kinds. Horizontal and vertical. I went with the latter - a. Warre hive. And I did get my bees from Wolf creek apiaries. So far, they are doing well in spite of the cold Midwestern weather.